


What A Diff’rence A Day Makes

by DreadPirateBrown



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: 1930s, Airplanes, Aviatrix, F/F, FBI, Punching Nazis, Secret Agent, green dress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-15
Packaged: 2019-07-28 13:51:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16242956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreadPirateBrown/pseuds/DreadPirateBrown
Summary: In 1938, Waverly Earp is poised to be the first female pilot to ever win Nationals, pulling her sister and herself out of poverty- until it all goes wrong.Freshly minted FBI field agent Nicole Haught arrives on scene thinking she’s lucked out on the case of a lifetime her first week on the job.Neither of them have any idea what they’re getting into.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, so this is what happens in a two minute conversation after I make a joke about that amazing green dress Kat graced us with. 
> 
> My brain goes absolutely nuts and produces the idea for this- what I picture would happen if The Rocketeer and Agent Carter had a really, really, really gay baby. 
> 
> I’m borrowing from everything and making up all the rules as I go.

 

Waverly Earp chewed her Beeman’s gum and stared at the most beautiful creature she’d ever seen. The Gee Bee was fifteen feet and one inch of pure screaming speed and it was all hers. She prowled slowly around the plane, her eyes searching for any imperfection, but she found none; the bright yellow and deep black paint perfectly applied, each rivet flush to the body.

Waverly ran her hand along the propeller, her skin tingling. Nationals was but weeks away and she finally had a shot at taking the title. No one believed a woman was capable of flying the Gee Bee, as she was constantly told, but the last thing an Earp was was a quitter and Waverly for damn sure was going to prove them wrong.

The brunette shoved her hands in the pockets of her tan leather flight jacket and took a step back, still admiring her steed, all five hundred and thirty five horses. With a top speed of over two hundred and eighty miles an hour, she had earned the name The Widowmaker, one of its most celebrated crack flyers meeting their end in her cockpit attempting to set a speed record.

Waverly had no one to make a widow of, and she set her shoulders unconsciously. She trusted in her skill and touch for planes. The title would be hers, _after_ a perfect landing.

“Take her to dinner before you fuck her, ok babygirl?”

“Wynonna! That’s both gross and anatomically impossible.”

Wynonna was wiping her greasy hands on a dirty red rag, her coveralls sporting an Earp Airfield patch and the name tag “Dick” in script on the other side. She shrugged.

“I’m sure someone has tried.”

Waverly made a face and turned back to the Gee Bee.

“It’s just weeks now, Wynonna. Then it’s Nationals and we’ll finally have a chance.”

“More than a chance, Waves. Nobody can beat you, especially not in this sexy thing. Just promise me you won’t do anything stupid when you’re up there. I mean it- you don’t get to leave me behind too.”

Waverly walked toward Wynonna and drew her into a hug, the taller woman not quite accepting the affection, and kissed her sister’s forehead.

“Of course not, Wynonna, you’re always stuck with me.”

“Good.” Her voice was rough, but Wynonna’s arms snaked around Waverly and she hugged her sister back for a second before letting go. Waverly rolled her eyes but smiled over her sister’s shoulder, giving her one last squeeze and then stepping away.

“You ready to give her a test run, Wave?”

Waverly’s grin was large and sparkling. “Hell yeah I am.”

—

The cockpit was snug, though Waverly had more room than most. She touched her finger between the dials to where she kept taped a picture of the Earp family, when everyone was still alive, then started flipping the series of switches that would bring the powerful plane to life. It was really just wings and a seat behind the growling Pratt & Whitney engine, built for speed. And speed was exactly what Waverly wanted.

The brunette pulled her leather flight cap and goggles into place, tucking her hair out of her face and adjusting the fit of her cap. Her first true flight in the Bee Gee and her whole body was near thrumming in anticipation. She’d been told she was too short, too woman, too Earp to fly the Bee Gee, to fly at all. But she was Waverly Goddamn Earp, and was not to be trifled with. She checked her gauges, everything was as it should be, and her grin threatened to claw it’s way right off her face with prideful accomplishment.

She felt the metal under her begin to vibrate as the engine fought against its idle and demanded to take to the sky. With visual confirmation from Doc from his spotting post, Waverly threw him a thumbs up and started out with speed toward the end of the runway, the same jubilant leap of her heart causing her to shiver as she felt aerodynamics take over as the plane left the dirt.

Waverly gave a whoop and banked the plane on a lazy circle around the airfield before zooming past the tiny assembled watch party, her landing gear only feet off the deck. Wynonna yelled as she went past, the words sucked behind her before she could even think to understand them and Waverly pulled back on the stick, gaining altitude and settled in for a bit of fun with the plane, warming up the engine before she began to feel for the edges of its performance.

Far below her, a different race was playing out.

—

It was Nicole Haught’s first week at the Purgatory Bureau field office and she never thought she’d be put quite so quickly into the thick of things. The car she was in roared over the countryside, barreling after one of the local mafia’s hired goons, currently in possession of stolen war technology that could put the whole nation at risk. Her head smacked against the low ceiling of the Ford and she cursed under her breath, her partner sparing a glance at her before he hunched back over the wheel and tried to put his foot even further to the floor.

“You alright there, Haught?”

Nicole nodded, though Dolls couldn’t see her.

“Yes, Mr. Ford just neglected to ask me about interior vehicle height before he designed his cars.”

Dolls laughed as he wrenched the wheel to the right and sent them skidding around a hummock before breaking out onto a dirt road, the goon’s car a few lengths ahead and attempting to pull away. She could see some sort of farm or business in the distance and figured the mobster was headed right for it.

“No so fast, buddy boy!”

Dolls seemed to will the Ford to pick up a few more horses and the car ahead grew just a little bit closer as they both flew down the rutted lane toward the buildings ahead.

The goon tried to shake them and pulled off the road and into a open field, the freshly planted neat rows instantly torn up under the car’s tires. Dolls had no choice but to pursue, the Ford almost gaining air off the edge of the roadway as he pushed the vehicle to its limit, thundering through the hoed soil.

Nicole had one hand glued to the dashboard, the other to the roof as they hurtled along, the goon’s buddy shoving a tommy gun out the passenger window and squeezing off a few rounds at them, most going wild but two finding their windshield, the fractured glass spiderwebbing across her view.

“Shit, Haught! And you thought you were going to be posted in sleepy little Purgatory! Get down!”

Nicole dropped to the floorboards as much as she could manage, the sounds of hot metal finding their car continuing.

“What the hell do they have, Dolls, that’s worth all this trouble?”

Dolls grimaced and began a defensive zig zag, attempting to stay out of the hail of bullets.

“Not our job to ask, Haught. Have to get it back, no matter what.”

Nicole shifted on the floor of the car and peered out the bottom of the windshield. They were drawing closer to what seemed to be a small airfield and she could hear the sound of an airplane motor somewhere. She realized she had a good shot at the guy with the gun and made her move, popping up enough to lean her arm and shoulder out the window, squeezing her trigger twice.

The first shot missed, but the second hit her target in the shoulder, the tommy gun swinging wildly and spraying bullets upward before the gun was lost from his grip. The goon pulled himself back in the car and Dolls whooped.

“Nice shot, Haught! You keep proving to me I was right to fight for your hire. We’re going to get you your first collar by the end of the day!”

They pursued the fleeing mobsters across the field, neither noticing the change in pitch of the engine far above them.

—

Things were going very wrong.

Waverly had been doing wider and wider loops around the airfield, her airspeed slowly approaching the edge of what she had experienced as a pilot and the thrill of it was beyond anything she had imagined. Her heart was thundering in her chest though she was lost in how everything fell away but that point ahead of her the Gee Bee was hurtling toward.

It was magical, until the next moment came and the engine gave a shuddering knock and began to slow quickly, the cockpit windshield abruptly soaked in engine oil. Waverly’s field of vision was immediately obscured and she yelled as the plane bucked under her controls, losing altitude though she was still hurtling forward at over two hundred miles an hour.

She needed to see, and fast. Waverly balled her fist up in her gloves and punched at the fragile windscreen, cracking and then breaking a hole through, getting a face full of oil, but allowing her to see past the splatters.

There was a great gout of greasy dark smoke coming from the engine and Waverly did her best to get the plane banked back around toward the airfield, knowing she didn’t have long to get back down to the ground before the plane decided to bow out with her still inside.

She yelled and cursed as the plane bumped and chugged along, her usually iron stomach fluttering as the engine cut out for a second and she gritted her teeth before another pop sounded and the grinding painful noise of the engine continued. She could fix whatever it was, as soon as she got back down, as _long_ as she got back down.

Waverly nosed the Gee Bee toward the dirt runway and hoped everyone could see to get out of the way. She was going to get one shot at this. She spit oil from her mouth and held on tight to the shaking control stick and aimed for the ground.

—

The distance between the two cars grew and Nicole’s right foot unconsciously pressed against the floorboard.

“What does he have in that thing? Two engines?”

Dolls smacked his hand on the wheel and snarled as he pursued.

The goon was heading toward a small hangar at the edge of the property and drove right in, the car disappearing into the darkness. He had half a field on them still and they followed as quickly as they could, pulling around the hangar in an effort to cut the henchmen off.

Their plan was thwarted as the car zipped out of the building just in front of them, heading straight through the airfield.

“Where the hell is he going? Can’t he see there’s a plane coming in to land?”

Dolls let the space between himself and the goon’s car grow, the dust kicking up behind it as they both pulled onto the dirt airstrip on the other side of the field.

Nicole could see the open doors of the main hangar ahead, the large letters spelling out EARP tall against the building. Her brow furrowed, she’d never thought there would be Earps around, in 1938. Seemed more of a fairytale than a true family story; even though Wyatt had only died a decade ago, his adventures of note were gone almost fifty years past. Part of an entirely different world than the one she belonged in now, industrialized and taking to the sky.

Only thing that never changed was lawmen chasing outlaws.

She shook herself out of her thoughts as she noticed the goon wasn’t changing course, and was dead set in playing chicken with the oncoming bright yellow plane. She could see it was in some sort of distress, smoke billowing out of the engine, but the pilot must have skill, as long as the wheels touched the ground, she thought they’d be alright, they were managing to keep the wings quite steady.

“That stupid dangerous bastard!”

Dolls cut the wheel and slammed on the brakes, hopping out of the vehicle. Realizing his intention, Nicole jumped out alongside and they both aimed for the driver, hoping to stop him before he collided with the plane. The air was noisy now between the incoming plane and their guns but she was oddly calm in her focus, clipping the driver’s shoulder through the back window. The car veered wild for a second before it righted, arrow straight for the plane.

The goon’s car raced forward, not giving an inch to the snarling, guttering beast of the plane as it bared down on the airstrip. The driver’s door swung wide as he jumped out and rolled like a rag doll away from the car. His vehicle continued on, speed never slowing.

Nicole could barely see the open mouth of the tiny pilot inside as they yelled something right before the car clipped the underside of the plane and tore off half the landing gear, the car continuing on down the airstrip and into a fuel tank, exploding in a fiery plume.

The plane landed perfectly on one wheel before gravity took over and the landing gear sheered off, the propellor spitting up waves of sparks as the wings and body smacked belly down on the airstrip and the whirling metal tried to dig through the rock as it had air.

Yellow and black scraped down the runway as the engine caught fire, the propellers stopped as they finally bent against the unyielding earth, the cockpit enveloped in thick smoke.

Nicole began to run toward the plane unthinking, a few folks thankfully already closer than she and with the same plan in mind. Dolls lit out toward their quarry, his long strides eating up the distance as the man tried to hobble away from where he’d landed.

She watched as the pilot was hastily dragged from the fiery plane, walking away a few feet before they dove back toward the cockpit and grabbed something from it before they allowed themselves to be pulled away to safety.

Nicole slowed to a jog as she approached the group, her gun still drawn but held to the side. The pilot ripped their flight cap off and threw it to the ground, yelling animatedly at the woman who stood next to her.

As Nicole drew closer the fight seemed to go out of both women and they looked at the plane, their shoulders drooping.

“Well, there goes that.” The taller of the two turned to the pilot and shrugged.

“Are you kidding me?” The pilot still had her back to Nicole but she could see the woman was several inches shorter than herself, though she couldn’t contain her unprofessional note of how well the flight suit fit her from behind. She was admiring the way the leather jacket framed the woman’s hips when the pilot spun around.

—

“And who the hell are _you?_ ”

The words were out of Waverly’s mouth before she could stop them, the person in front of her not at all who she expected. The tall redhead was glamorous and a shiver went across Waverly’s skin; there was something seductive to how she stood, long legs barely on display in her sensible pant suit but enticing nonetheless, warm brown eyes searching her own, thin shapely fingers curled around the pistol she carried.

The redhead straightened and reached inside her jacket, holding up a badge, a proud look on her face.

“Agent Nicole Haught, FBI.”

Wynonna snickered behind her and she saw uncertainty flash across the woman’s eyes before it was locked behind steely professionalism.

“Are you the owners of this airfield?”

Wynonna stepped past Waverly and folded her arms across her chest.

“Yeah we are, but I’m standing next to a plane I just hauled my sister out of that’s still on fire. Don’t you think whatever it is you have to say can wait a damn minute?”

The woman’s incredible honey eyes flicked over to her and then back to Wynonna. Waverly was so suddenly entranced, she’d forgotten how angry she was.

“This is important federal business, ma’am.”

“Important federal- ok, and I’m done with you. Doc! Grab that firehose and the sand, gotta get this fire out!”

Wynonna hurried past the agent into the hangar and Waverly was left standing with the enticing stranger, her own emotions an agitated bunch. She turned back toward the Gee Bee, her heart plummeting to her shoes, the extent of the damage so much more apparent from the outside of the plane. The engine was toast, the wings scraped and dented from the ground, the propellers bent back nearly in half. The heat from the fire beat against her skin even from this distance and it brought her anger back to the surface.

Waverly didn’t stop to think again about the beguiling woman behind her and focused on the plane- her livelihood, her future, her dreams…literally going up in smoke. Someone was going to make this right.

—

Nicole stood awkwardly staring at the pilot’s back, the expressive face now turned away from her. Even in anger the woman was beautiful, Nicole was unsurprised to notice that the snarl in her voice hadn’t scared her, but had honestly drawn Nicole in, called her interest a bit more than was allowable.

She pulled her focus away and looked for Dolls, trying to get back into a professional space. Her eyes found him cuffing the suspect to the back door of their Ford, steam rising from under the hood, seemed the tommy gun had gotten some shots in on their radiator too.

“Haught! Call in for back up and fire.” Dolls called out to her as he wrestled with the suspect. She nodded and turned toward the airfield office.

Handed the phone by a decently sized man named Shorty, she placed the call to the Bureau and local engine company, she could already hear the fire alarm sounding from the direction of town.

Nicole had made her way back to Dolls, who was attempting to get information out of the mafia’s triggerman.

“Where’s the package?”

“Check the car, it’s blown to bits, Fed.” The mobster started laughing before he coughed, smiling even as he grimaced.

“Damnit.” Dolls straightened with a scowl, moving away from the suspect and kicking at the dirt of the airfield.

Nicole knew she was new to the case, but whatever they’d been chasing had to be of major importance, when she’d mentioned on the phone that the car had exploded, the agent on the other end had hung up in his haste to get their fellows moving toward the airfield.

The car in question was still on fire, the fuel truck it was half buried in burning away, making the warm summer day even hotter. The acrid smoke filled her lungs and she sighed as she warily walked closer, seeing if there was anything from the wreck she could pick out before it was all burned away completely.

As she looked into the car through the flames, Nicole could see a large suitcase sticking up. That had to be the package Dolls was after, that the Bureau wanted protected. There weren’t too many flames in the backseat and if Nicole could get the door open, there was a good chance she could get to it before the fire did. She looked around her quickly and saw a long metal bar laying in a pile of abandoned construction materials and she ran over to grab it before she hurried back to the car.

Nicole shoved the bar into the bent frame of the back door and pulled on her impromptu lever, straining against the metal. Just as her muscles were about to give up, the door gave way and flew open, Nicole tumbling to the ground as it did. She was lucky to do so, the flames finding the car’s gas tank and it exploded, pressing her further into the ground with the force of the blast.

She struggled to her knees and looked into the backseat where the flames now raged, the suitcase engulfed. She growled in annoyance and reached for the bar, advancing on the growing heat with determination.

“Haught! What the hell are you playing at? Get away from there!”

Nicole could hear Dolls but knew she had one last chance at getting the suitcase before the whole car was destroyed.

“I got this!”

She held the metal rod out in front of her, holding as close to the end as she could. The heat was making her eyes water at this distance, an all enveloping wall that kept the air in her lungs singed and hard to draw; she reached for the handle of the now blackened suitcase with the rod and tried to hook it, on the second perilous try she was successful, sweat pouring down her face.

Nicole yanked with every ounce of muscle she had left and pulled the suitcase from the fire, collapsing backward as her prize landed, smoking, on the ground next to her. She felt hands grab her underneath her armpits and then she was being dragged away from the fire. Put down gently, she looked up to see Dolls’ worried face.

“Kid, I already said I liked you, you don’t need to go and get yourself killed first week on the job. No one wants to be up on the wall that badly, ok?”

Nicole, of course, would be honored to be up on the same wall as any other agent who gave their lives while on duty, but Dolls was right, if that happened, she wanted it to be far from now.

“I’m good, Dolls, really. Not aiming for the wall.”

He leveled a look at her but relented, stepping away and allowing her to get up and dust herself off.

Nicole looked over to where the suitcase lay, the clasps broken open. It would only take a flip of the lid to see what it held, to know what was worth one man’s life and almost the lives of three others, not to mention what had gone into stealing the item from Howard Hughes in the first place. She moved toward the package, picking up the metal rod as she went.

The redhead approached the suitcase, knocking the top askew with the rod. She fit the tip into the break in the pieces and leveraged the top up, catching the gleam of the fire on something shiny and chrome before a hand closed over her shoulder and she dropped the rod in surprise. She spun to meet the eyes of the Bureau Chief.

“Sir!”

“I like your enthusiasm, Haught, but unless you want to be charged with treason, best leave that closed.”

“Sorry, Sir. Right.”

Nicole stepped back and let the Bureau recovery team take over, the suitcase carefully retrieved and stored. She couldn’t help but wonder though, what was in the suitcase that would shine like that? Like the chrome of an airplane? She knew it was going to be a puzzle her mind wouldn’t let go of easily but she obeyed the Chief and helped interview the witnesses left on the ground.

—

Waverly watched the last few flames sputter and die out, the smoking hulk of twisted metal that was her glorious Gee Bee, grounded, probably permanently, on its maiden flight. Everything she’d done, all the grinding and scrimping and saving and doing jobs she’d rather have said no to; it all went into the work that she and Wynonna and the crew had put in for three years to build her, gone in minutes.

She wanted to cry, but she wouldn’t let herself, not in front of all of these FBI agents and half the town that had gathered to gawk at the now cordoned off scene.

Waverly turned toward the approaching sound of voices, Wynonna loud and aggravated, the man she was speaking to clearly unimpressed by her tone.

“I don’t care who you are, that car took out our plane on our property and you’d better pay for it.”

“Like I told you doll, write to Uncle Sam about it, I’m not walking around with dough in my pockets to hand out to bystanders when the bad guys go ‘oops.’”

Waverly knew what was going to happen before the Fed did, and shook her head. Wynonna stopped in her tracks and turned toward the man; in one fluid movement, she brought her fist up and socked him right in the jaw. He staggered back and spit blood, looking both surprised and enraged.

“Why I ‘oughta!” He advanced on Wynonna before three of his coworkers grabbed him and held him back.

“Let it go, Jim, it’s not worth the paperwork.”

The agent bristled. “You gonna let her deck me and not put her in cuffs? You getting soft on me Fred?”

“Nah, just want to get the hell out of this shithole town. Faster, the better.”

With a look of disgust, he spit another mouthful of blood at Wynonna’s feet and stalked off. Waverly whirled on the remaining agents.

“You’re really going to leave us here like this? That plane was our livelihood!”

“Well, lady, maybe you should get a real woman’s job and stop playing at being a pilot. This wouldn’t happen if you were behind a desk.”

Wynonna’s arms were wrapped around her body before she could lunge at him, the agent’s only response to sigh and shake his head as he walked away.

“You dames lately have some whack-a-doodle ideas about life.”

Waverly seethed, the edges of her vision tinted red as she followed the agent, boring her eyes into the back of his head. If only she could make his skull explode by sheer will.

“Can I let you go?”

Waverly sighed and nodded, Wynonna releasing her hold. She realized her hands were still balled into tight fists when even her short nails had begun to slice into the skin of her palms and she uncurled them, wincing to see the small cuts.

“What are we going to do, Wynonna?”

“Well, we’ve always got Pocket Rocket.”

Waverly sighed, utterly dejected.

“Alright, lets get her fueled up. Can’t do anything with the Gee Bee until it cools down anyway.”

—

Nicole watched the suspect through the two way mirror into the interrogation room, though her brain was a million miles away, her focus split between the mystery in the suitcase and the one in the leather flight jacket. The pilot was the harder mystery to solve, and far more personally intriguing. A woman pilot in 1938 was rare enough, but one who owned her own airfield and was attempting, quite handily, to fly a Gee Bee, one of the most notorious planes in the air? _Who was she? What was her story?_

Even if she wasn’t one of the most stunning women Nicole had ever laid eyes on, for her accomplishments alone Nicole would want to know, but the passionate hazel eyes and athletic hips drew her in, she couldn’t lie. Even though navigating her sexuality in the world she lived in was difficult, often perilous, there was something about the pilot that made her think perhaps the girl might have an understanding of what it meant to be a little lavender.

She hadn’t seen much of the diminutive brunette after she’d started taking statements, only hearing later about how the pilot’s sister had given a good right hook to one of the agents Nicole had already pegged as a complete wet sock. She expected the man totally deserved it, based on her own experiences this week, and felt a small bit of warmth grow for the firebrand siblings.

“We wasting your time, Haught?”

Nicole snapped her eyes to the agent in charge of the case.

“Sorry, Sir. No, you are definitely not.”

“Might want to pay more attention then.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Nicole mentally kicked herself and focused back on the interrogation, though the suspect had yet to say a helpful word in the three hours since his capture. She’d have to save her musings about the pilot until later. At least the case file would have her name, so she could stop calling her just “the pilot.” Nicole bet herself it was a name to match the girl’s beautiful eyes.

Curbing her thoughts, Nicole sighed and listened to the agent as he continued his line of questioning.

—

Waverly Earp. What a name, indeed. It fit the pilot, unique enough that Nicole hadn’t heard it before, yet giving a softer side to the spunk she’d shown earlier. She rolled the sound of it along her tongue and found herself smiling.

Nicole looked through the case file and absorbed everything she could about the Earp sisters, their father and all the small anecdotes the other agents were able to glean from the townspeople. Seemed the family had had quite a troubled past, Waverly’s older sister actually having killed their father when they were both young; though the last few years it seemed Wynonna and Waverly had turned most of the fortunes of the airfield around, or were starting to, there was a modest profit reported the previous year and the townspeople spoke favorably about the sisters.

“Hey Haught- guess what?”

Dolls dropped into the wooden chair next to his partner and pulled at his collar, the few ceiling fans in the Bureau’s office doing little to move the stale air.

Nicole shrugged. “No idea, Dolls.”

“Seems you would have been executed for taking a peek of a vacuum cleaner.”

“Wait, what?”

Dolls leaned forward after glancing around. “Just heard from one of my pals in evidence that the suitcase you rescued? There was a vacuum cleaner stuffed inside. Whatever it is we’re hunting for, at some point the twit switched out the real gear for some old lady’s vacuum. We’re going to have to search top to bottom the whole airfield, starting with that hangar. They’re working on the warrant now.”

Nicole leaned back in her chair. She was frustrated that her actions had been for nought, but she couldn’t shake the tiny spark that had erupted at the realization she’d probably get to see Waverly again, and soon.

“How long’s that gonna take?”

—

Waverly and Wynonna entered the smaller hangar and stopped in front of an old biplane, one that had seen endless better years. The faded paint alongside tried to make the world aware that it was the famous “Pocket Rocket”, fastest plane east and west of Purgatory River.

Waverly ran a hand over the prop and brought away dust, the plane had sat idle for months as they had finished the preparations on the Gee Bee and it showed, it would need quite a bit of love to get back in the sky. She rested her forehead on the wood and called on every deity she could think of to curse the driver of the car that had hit her plane.

Every dream she had went down with the speedster, and she honestly couldn’t see a solution. The Gee Bee was going to their meal ticket and way out, out of the debt of the airfield. They were going to be able to pay off the mortgage their daddy created during the Depression and she and Wynonna could finally put into play the dreams they’d had for the property.

They held an air show every weekend that was decently popular, but people would have come from counties near and far to see the Gee Bee, to see her race it. She wanted every little girl sitting on those oak slats to know that one day they too could be the pilot of their own plane, but more so their own destiny. The Gee Bee would also pull men who would want to challenge her, quite happy to put up a large wager for a chance to fly circles around her.

She’d be happy to knock them down as fast as they lined themselves up.

All that was gone now, a smoldering wreck of metal sitting in the middle of their runway. The FBI had even hauled off the goon driving the car before she could get at him, the feeling of an unfulfilled promise grating under her skin. There would be retribution somehow, this random day couldn’t be the end to everything.

“You in there, babygirl?”

Waverly looked up to see Wynonna’s concerned eyes.

She shrugged.

“We’ll figure it out, Waves, we always do. Now hop up there and we’ll test out the rudder bar, make sure it still works.”

Waverly nodded and scrambled up the lower wing, pulling herself over the edge of the cockpit wall. She let out a yelp, her feet getting squished quickly as she hit against a large object stuffed inside.

“Wynonna there’s something in here, come help me.”

—

The sisters set the box on the wide shop workbench, the decently sized crate needing both of them to maneuver it out of the cockpit and across the hangar.

“What do you think is in it?”

“Only one way to find out.”

Wynonna reached for a crowbar and wedged it under the lid of the box, prying lose the nails of three sides before pulling the top all the way off.

Both sisters were stunned into silence.

Waverly had never seen something so alien.

“What is it?”

Wynonna shrugged and leaned over the box, reaching in to carefully put her hands on the object and lift it out. It was the size of a few bread boxes, brilliantly smooth metal and looked vaguely aerodynamic. There were a few leather straps attached to it, but Waverly had no idea their function.

“What do you think it does?”

“I’ve never seen anything like it, Wynonna. Oh, look! There’s a button on this strap here. What if I-”

As soon as Waverly pushed down on the tiny metal button, there was a roar and the bottom of the object spit flame and the whole thing took off, zooming forward.

“Hit the deck, it’s alive!”

Wynonna tackled her to the floor as the thing hit the wall of the hangar and headed toward the ceiling, banging off a cross beam and heading straight at them. They both yelped and rolled out of the way, the heat of the engine leaving a warm trail behind.

The flying metal took a few more turns through the hangar before it buried itself half in a cupboard door and stopped, twin barrels of flame coming out the end.

Waverly rushed over with a broom but hesitantly hit the button again with the dowel, sighing thankfully as the engine cut out and the object shuddered still.

“Be careful!” Wynonna cried but Waverly was already moving forward with he hand stretched out. She was surprised when her skin hit the metal and it was almost cool to the touch, barely any indication of the flames that had been pouring out the bottom moments before.

“It’s ok, Wynonna, Its not hot.”

“It’s not?”

“No, I think it’s some kind of propulsion system. Wait a minute.”

Waverly put her foot to the cupboard door and yanked the object out, the heavy weight noticeable but not overwhelming. She grabbed one strap and fed her arm through it, hoisting the object over her shoulder and putting her other arm through the opposite strap.

She watched the realization dawn on Wynonna’s face after she clipped the waist and chest belts, adjusting them to her body.

“I think this is made for people.”

“Holy shit, Waves. You look like a tiny superhero.”

The weight was comfortable against the thick leather of her flight jacket, evenly distributed by the straps.

Waverly’s finger found the button she had hit earlier and hovered above it, she was so curious to see what would happen.

“Woah woah, there, babygirl,” Wynonna carefully moved her hand away from the button. “We’re going to have to do some tests before I let you just walk out of this hangar and press that button.”

Waverly grinned. Maybe not all hope was lost.

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Earp sisters get into trouble, Dolls & Nicole head to the Earp Airfield for some FBI business & Waverly and Nicole get closer than they should.

“Was this really our _only_ option?” Waverly whispered to her sister as they wrapped the rope around the statue.

Wynonna shushed her with a look but shook her head.

“No, it was just the most _fun_ option. Plus I can’t wait to see Del Rey’s face when he pulls up to the office in the morning and the statue he built to himself won’t be there! Prick.” She gave the statue the finger. “Help me grab the saw.”

Waverly pulled the knot tight and followed Wynonna back to the bed of the truck, the night thankfully slightly overcast, perfect for all the sneaking around they were doing. Her eyes darted to the other buildings in the square but no one else was about in the wee hours except her and her sister.

She tied off the end of the rope to the trailer hitch, her hands quickly knotting the statue securely to the truck. Wynonna was already holding one side of the wide misery whip, the crosscut saw a good five feet long. Waverly grabbed her end and walked back over to the statue. They lined the teeth of the saw up perfectly and coordinated the first thrust, the sharp teeth easily cutting through the weathered wood of the statue’s base.

Bobo Del Rey stood seven feet tall above the top of the pedestal, thankfully cast in a cheap lightweight metal, Waverly wasn’t sure they’d manage their mischief, otherwise. The top of the base was nearly cut through and the sisters paused, working the saw back out of the channel they’d created. They tossed the saw back in the bed and both jumped in the cab, Wynonna starting up the engine and putting the truck in gear.

“This might make a little bit of noise.” Wynonna grinned and put one arm across the seat back as she looked out the rear window and put her foot to the accelerator.

Waverly braced herself against the dashboard and watched out the back window as the rope uncoiled and then took up slack, a pause as the tension completed between truck and statue before there was a loud crack of the statue breaking from the wooden base and then near immediately an answering metallic clang as Bobo hit the deck.

Wynonna let the statue drag a few yards before she hit the brakes, sparks flying up from the road.

“Best chance I’m gonna get to mess his face up like I want to,” she said with a smirk, throwing the truck in park and darting out of the cab.

Waverly jumped out too, moving to the bed. They worked quickly, glances spared around them as they lifted the rather unwieldy statue and hefted it into the bed of the truck, Bobo landing face down on the tarp laid out for him, feet sticking out the end.

“Just like him to be kissing floor with his kiester up on the job,” Wynonna cracked and Waverly rolled her eyes, coiling the rope back up around her arm before she threw it in the bed, right on top of Bobo.

The sisters shoved at the broken off base and secured Bobo to the truck, both taking one last look around to make sure they hadn’t left any evidence behind. Waverly jumped in the passenger side and Wynonna put them back in gear, easing them down the road with the headlights off until they were far enough away from Town Hall that the older brunette could give the truck some gas and head out toward the airfield.

—

Thankfully in the middle of the open field next to the airstrip, they were the only humans for a mile or more and the sound of Waverly’s heavy mallet against the thick metal tent stake could be overheard by no one.

They had backed the truck into the vast space, yanked Bobo out of the bed and set him as vertical as they could. Waverly wrapped chains around and through his legs, spiked the tent stake through the ends and used the mallet to drive the stake deep into the earth.

Wynonna pulled the large canvass duffle from the front seat and untied the clasp, the cloth falling open to reveal their mysterious gift. She lifted the contraption and set about attaching it around Bobo’s metal chest, his self-congratulatory stance helping to get the straps situated. Finally happy with how tight they were, she stepped away and brushed her hands.

Waverly gave the tent stake one last thwack, feeling the burn in her arm muscles as she hefted the mallet up over her shoulder and then reversed course, swinging it downward onto the waiting stake.

“You know, if Pocket Rocket goes sideways too, you’d have a decent career as a Strongwoman in one of those traveling freak shows.”

Waverly wiped the sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand, a stripe of dark earth smearing across her skin from the soil she’d been crouched in and she stuck her tongue out at her sister.

“Stuck on the ground? No thank you.”

Wynonna grinned and gestured to their set up.

“You ready to see what happens?”

Waverly shrugged.

“What have we got to lose?”

“That’s the spirit, babygirl.”

Waverly had rigged a way to push the button on the pack from a distance and they took up position behind the truck, parked a good fifty feet away.

“Here goes!” Waverly jammed her finger down, and after a brief second that felt like forever, she heard the click in the still night air and then a whoosh as the engine lit.

Bobo shot into the sky a good twenty feet before his motion was arrested by the chain, he pulled on it like a dog after the mailman, but the stake held firm for the moment. Lacking an up, Bobo started making orbits in the air around the stake, the statue parallel to the ground, whipping by.

Wynonna and Waverly shared a look of dumbfounded awe.

“It really is a fucking jetpack, Waves! We found the future!”

“Wynonna- this could change everything!”

Waverly watched her sister’s face, her sparkling excited eyes reflected in the light of the jetpack’s flames. If they could somehow hang on to the jetpack, even if the Gee Bee was out of commission until next year- everyone would want to come see the flying marvel. And pay. They could still be alright, hang onto their dreams.

“Hey Waves, you sure you secured that stake well, right?”

“Yeah, why?”

“I think Bobo’s about to have other ideas.”

Wynonna’s focus was fixed over her shoulder and she followed her sister’s sightline, turning to see. Bobo’s exuberant flight had indeed worked the tent stake loose and his circles had become erratic.

“Waverly! The button!”

She dove for her makeshift control and smashed her thumb to the device. There was no response, the jetpack continued to roar behind her.

“It’s not working, Wynonna!” She kept jamming her finger down, to no avail.

With a scraping, slick sound the stake yanked free of the moist earth and Bobo took off into the inky sky, the two glowing fiery marks of the jetpack exhaust their only clue as to the trail he was taking farther and farther into the night.

_“Son of a bitch! Motherless goose!”_

Wynonna shook her fist at the tiny speck of the jetpack, nearly hopping in her anger.

“Jackhole Bobo ruining everything, always!”

Waverly slumped down against the side of the truck, not caring about the damp soil she landed on and tucked her head onto her bent knees, her arms wrapping around her legs. They had been so close. Stupid stake. Stupid mafia. Stupid fucking FBI. She smacked her head back against the side panel and sighed loudly.

A flash of red went through her brain and a second passed before she connected the flash to the statuesque redheaded agent that had shown up right after the crash. How could she have forgotten about that face? Those legs? Waverly could blame the fact that she’d literally just walked away from a fiery crash landing, but she still shook her head at herself on the inside. She’d let the redhead out of her sight, too despondent over the Gee Bee and hadn’t seen the woman again. She wondered if she ever would.

That shit ticket mobster had fucked up everything, and left them a cursed gift, too. Which she figured must be entering low Earth orbit by now, never to be seen again.

Waverly closed her eyes and tried to take a deep breath. Even if they didn’t have the jetpack, whoever the mobster was carrying it for might come looking to see where it had gone. That was an issue. The FBI clearly wanted it. Issue number two. Plus this technology was way beyond the skill of the mob, so who had built it? For what?

“Babygirl. Wave. Waves. _Waverly_ _move!!_ ”

Waverly’s eyes snapped open to see Bobo hurtling toward her and she dove to her left, the statue careening off the side of the truck and digging a furrow headfirst down the field, now sputtering and misfiring. It buried itself in the soil as the engine hitched and then wheezed before falling silent.

Waverly stood up and brushed herself off, hesitantly moving toward the statue.

“You sure that’s the whizz thing to do right now?” Wynonna hissed at her sister, eying Bobo warily.

“I think it ran out of fuel. I can just push the button on it when I get close enough and it will be off, anyway.”

Waverly’s steps became more confident the longer the engine stayed quiet. As she started to reach out toward the button she was still amazed by the lack of heat she felt. Any engine running that long should be hot enough to cook eggs on and she couldn’t feel a stitch of temperature difference the closer she got.

She quickly pushed the button, visibly relaxing once the jetpack was shut down.

Wynonna came up alongside her.

“Well, we’ll have to figure out what it runs on.”

“That’s not all, Wynonna. Where did it come from? Who built it?”

Wynonna shrugged. “Don’t know, Wave. I’m more worried about the mobsters who had it and decided to stash it with us. We don’t need anyone coming down on the airfield looking to make things right. We need to hide it.”

Waverly shook her head. “This is the answer to _everything_ , Wynonna. Forget Pocket Rocket, we add this to the barnstorming show and people are going to lose it! If I’m out there, doing loops wearing this thing, everyone’s going to want to see the flying woman, we could pay off the mortgage in no time.”

Wynonna frowned and looked between the slightly smoking jetpack and her sister’s determined eyes. She sighed and walked closer to the statue, noticing that Bobo’s head had been half caved in by his ricochet off the truck.

“First we’re going to need to get you a helmet.”

—

“I’m telling you, Eliza. There’s something to this girl.”

“Yes, Haught, you’ve been telling me for hours now. Are we going out or not?”

Nicole looked at her roommate through the vanity mirror, Eliza leaning against the doorframe of her bedroom.

“You’re insufferable. I could have just met the love of my life and you’re making light of my pain!”

Shapiro picked up a decorative pillow off Nicole’s bed and threw it at the back of her head.

“You talked to the woman for all of two seconds. And she yelled at you. You don’t even know if she speaks Sapphist.”

“She’s a pilot, Eliza. A leather flight jacket wearing _pilot_. How could she be straight?”

“Look at Pancho Barnes. Could have been the hottest daddy this side of the Mississippi, but no, runs after men like they’re collectible. Admirable, though.”

Nicole snorted and shook her head at Eliza.

“Waverly isn’t Barnes.”

“Right, and you’d rather _be_ Waverly’s daddy.”

“Eliza!” Nicole sputtered, spinning around on her vanity stool to stare wide eyed at her best friend. “I don’t- that’s not-”

Eliza raised an eyebrow. “You can’t fool me, Haught. I know you too well.”

Nicole ducked her head to break eye contact with Eliza and blushed as red as her hair.

“…that’s not _all_ I’d be,” she mumbled under her breath.

“What was that Haught?”

Nicole gave Eliza a faux withering look.

“Nothing, you dip.”

Eliza grinned in triumph.

—

“Well there’s your trouble,” Doc drawled as they stood around the now cold husk of the Gee Bee the next morning.

He pointed out a row of bullet holes in the engine cowling, punching straight through the metal and making mincemeat of the delicate parts underneath.

Waverly threw her leather work gloves down and stomped away from the airplane with a growl, leaving Wynonna and Doc to watch her go. She headed around the side of the hangar and leaned against the still cool metal, the early morning sun not having enough time yet to warm it.

She was so tired of this. Every time they got a little bit back on their feet, something came flying out of nowhere to smack them back down again. Mama left, but then Daddy got the airfield. Then Daddy got mean and Wynonna had to choose between herself, Waverly & their father’s life. Then the two of them had the airfield. And the debt.

Their father had dealt with the Depression by cultivating a gambling problem the sisters hadn’t known about, being children, but he had put up the airfield as collateral during an ill-advised game of drunken five card stud and lost spectacularly to one Bobo Del Ray, part time Mayor of Purgatory and full time collective pain in the Earp’s lives.

Their father had begged the next morning to somehow undo the hand, but Bobo knew he had their father in a tight spot and had offered him a tantalizing deal- Ward could buy back the airfield, as long as he also bought his fuel from Del Rey. He had their father giving him twice the money, and the “mortgage” written up wouldn’t be paid off for twenty years, a constant struggle to fuel the airplanes that performed and helped pay the monthly bill.

There were still eleven years and over six thousand dollars left to the mortgage. She’d wanted the Gee Bee to pay the debt off quicker and release her and Wynonna from the contract, but with their investment in the plane now in the air, everything seemed quite a bit bleaker than the day before.

Waverly groaned and rested her forehead against the siding, the cool surface clearing her head. Unbidden, her thoughts turned to the redhead and she pushed away from the building, shaking herself. Was no use to think about a dish, even one as lovely as the agent, when everything was going to Hell.

—

“Alright partner, we’ve got the warrant. You coming?” Dolls grabbed his suit jacket off the chair and pulled it on over his wide shoulders.

“Wouldn’t miss it.” Nicole jumped up from her desk and picked up her wide brimmed hat, following Dolls out of the Bureau and to their issued car.

“So what’s our scope?”

Dolls tossed her the folded up warrant as he started the old Ford up.

“All we got was the hangar and immediate surrounding area, but that dropper had the goods on him, he didn’t stop anywhere else, it has to be there.”

Nicole nodded as she finished reading the warrant and tucked it into the inner pocket of her jacket, looking out the window as they headed toward Earp Airfield. She felt the tiniest fluttering of butterflies and glared at her stomach, though she couldn’t deny she was looking forward to a chance at seeing Waverly again. She needed- well that was a little intense- she’d like to know more about the girl, if she even had a chance or if she was barking up the wrong tree entirely.

She figured that was the reason for her dogged interest in the girl, after so brief a contact, the curiosity of knowing if she had pegged the pilot right or not. Her accidental word choice caused Nicole to blush and squirm in the passenger seat. She leaned forward and rolled down the window to get some fresh air, it was suddenly too hot in the car. Nicole clamped down on her errant imagination and cursed for not the first time that it was so immediately active.

“You ok over there, Haught?”

She found Dolls glancing at her with an eyebrow raised and a concerned tilt of his head.

“Yeah, no, I’m good, just needed some air.”

He looked dubious, but accepted her answer, his eyes sliding back to the road.

“I want you to interview the pilot, I saw how her sister was giving everyone grief yesterday and I really like a challenge.” His grin was toothy and Nicole had to chuckle, then she processed what he’d said.

She was going to interview Waverly. _Yes!_

The rest of the trip went swiftly, the open farmland and forests going past Nicole’s eyes with barely a second registering, she was too deep in her head making sure she’d formulated how she wanted to ask the pilot without asking the pilot exactly what she wanted to know.

She was an FBI agent, for crimininy, she could do this.

—  
  
Waverly shielded her eyes from the sun at the sound of a car approaching, she’d been working on the Gee Bee all morning, stripping down parts that could be salvaged and seeing what was too destroyed by the mobster’s bullets to keep. At least they could get money for the scrap.

As the car got closer she saw it was the same imposing FBI agent from the crash at the wheel, the one who had taken the goon away before she could boot him a good few. Her eyes slid left to the passenger and her body gave a little twitch, she could see the red tresses from here, even under the wide brim of the agent’s hat.

Waverly ducked into the cool interior of the hangar to grab some water from the jug and prepare herself.

She was a little nervous, she noticed, but what also bubbled up suddenly was the anger, Doc finding the bullet holes proved it was directly the FBI’s fault that her plane had crashed, or nearly so. They’d have to reimburse them for the damages. And the very people who she needed to speak to harshly about that were delivering themselves to her doorstep. _Excellent_. One less hassle to deal with. She could yell at them, they could leave, and her day would continue on smoothly, she had several hours planned for more worrying over how she was going to handle if the mafia showed up as well.

A small voice in her skull reminded her about the redhead and she told it to split, even as she made sure to tame a few wayward strands that had escaped her braid, tucking them behind her ear before she wiped her face hastily on a clean nearby rag.

—

Nicole swung the Ford’s door open and stepped out onto the airstrip in front of the hangar, the Gee Bee still sitting where it had landed, the paint now blackened and peeling, the chrome smoke scarred. She felt a twinge of guilt; it had been the car she was chasing that had taken out the landing gear. She wasn’t sure why there had been engine trouble, but the plane should have been in much better shape if she’d neutralized the driver, not just clipped him. Was too late to do anything about it, but it still didn’t sit right with her.

The agent adjusted the brim of her hat and turned toward the hangar, catching Waverly just as she was emerging from the dark cavernous space and into the bright sunshine.

Nicole was gut punched by the sight of her.

Waverly was sun kissed skin from the top of her forehead right down to the tantalizing strip of muscled flesh visible above the rolled down half of the mechanic’s coveralls she wore, sitting low on her hips, and Nicole could barely breathe. The pilot’s hair was in a long braid over her shoulder and the man’s sleeveless undershirt she was wearing clung to her body like a glove, molding to _every_ curve. Air was suddenly scarce and Nicole couldn’t stop the flush of heat that ran rampant down her body.

The pilot was sinewy but clearly strong, the muscles under her skin apparent and Nicole unconsciously bit her lip as Waverly walked closer to the agent, her forearms flexing as she wiped her hands on a rag.

“What can I do for you folks?”

—

_You have to say something, dammit. Just use words!_

Waverly’s brain had stopped functioning and she was moving forward out of the hangar on autopilot. She’d seen the passenger door opening and then that was it- her brain had shut off except for one overwhelming thought- _woof_.

She wasn’t proud of it, but there it was.

The agent stepped out of the Ford like a starlet onto a red carpet, her head tilting to clear her hat of the low doorway before she stood straight, moving beyond the door and closing it, revealing her silhouette to the pilot.

Today it was a skirt suit, modestly cut just below the knee but the length of leg it hinted at beyond the curve of shapely calves had started a burn in Waverly’s belly, the low heels giving the redhead just that bit more presence. The suit was dark blue, almost black, the hat a light cream that did _everything_ for the pilot. Waverly couldn’t help her staring, her eyes disobeying and mapping every line and curve of the woman in front of her. She had completely forgotten about the Gee Bee, the mob, her anger.

Waverly realized she was still walking forward and needed to speak, greet the arrivals in some sort of fashion.

“What can I do for you folks?”

_What kind of hayseed shit was that, Earp? Get it together!_

Waverly cleared her throat and shifted her attention to the other agent, a much safer choice, though she caught an unreadable expression flit across his face as he looked between the two women, frowning before he met Waverly’s eyes and squared his shoulders.

“Good morning, Ms.Earp, we have a warrant we need to execute. It seems our suspect may have left some valuable property behind. Agent Haught, the warrant?”

—

Nicole mentally shook herself out of her thoughts and reached into her suit jacket, removing the warrant and holding it out to the pilot. The brunette took a few steps forward and grasped the other end, Nicole noting her clean short nails as she took the document with an even expression.

The pilot flipped it open and read, Nicole taking the time to follow the line of the brunette’s neck up from her delicate collarbones right to the kissable angle of her jaw. She was trying to stay professional, but her eyes weren’t listening.

A cleared throat from next to her broke the spell and she glanced over to see Dolls’ eyebrows slightly narrowed in confusion. Guess that was something she was going to have to address, at some point. She liked Dolls, they had worked well so far along the week, and the burly man had a gentle side to him that made her comfortable in giving him her trust.

He’d been supportive the moment she arrived, quite different from most of the rest of the rank and file, the Bureau Chief thankfully in her corner as well. They both knew they made an unconventional pair, each fighting against stereotypes and years of ingrained intolerance. Purgatory was an outlier, and Nicole was learning that it manifested that intriguing quality in so many ways.

—

Waverly read the warrant- that it allowed the agents to search the smaller hangar Pocket Rocket sat in and the area directly outside of it to a distance of thirty feet. Only known to her and Wynonna, the jetpack was stashed safely in its canvass bag under the floorboards of the house, a good quarter mile or so on the other side of the airfield from where they stood, far far beyond the perimeter of the search warrant.

They could search the hangar from now until the end of time and wouldn’t find it. Waverly relaxed and handed the warrant back to the redhead with a quirk of her lips that was almost a smile, she knew if she let her interest slip, she’d forget what she needed to focus on.

“Is your sister on the premises?”

Waverly looked over to the redhead’s partner and indicated the hangar with a jerk of her chin.

“Wynonna’s inside working on a project, why?”

The man stood a little straighter. “Bureau business. I would appreciate it if you would accompany my partner to the hangar so she can begin the investigation. I will join you momentarily.” He subtly adjusted his lapels and walked toward the hangar, leaving the two women to avoid each other’s gaze.

—

Nicole watched Dolls’ disappear into the vast shadowed space and swallowed thickly. _Professional. She could be professional._

“So, ma’am. The hangar?”

—

Waverly’s head shot up from where she’d been studying some very interesting weeds pushing up through a crack in the worn runway and gave the redhead an incredulous look.

“ _Ma’am?_ Do I look that old to you??”

The redhead sputtered. “No, you don’t look- you are very- you do look- I was just trying to be polite?”

Her tone made the statement more of a question and something in Waverly twitched again. This woman must spend so much of her time straitlaced and buttoned up, well, except for the one pearl button at the top of her blouse, she noticed, the slight visible pulse under the redhead’s pale skin making her swallow unconsciously and wet her lips with the tip of her tongue.

She could see the hitch in the delicate musculature of the agent’s neck as she did so and the roiling heat in her stomach appeared again, much to her chagrin. Staying focused with the redhead around was becoming downright difficult.

—

The way Waverly was looking at her made the little hairs on the back of Nicole’s neck prickle, it was a subtle evaluation, but was one still and she could feel her body starting to respond to the interest. When the tip of the pilot’s tongue made an appearance, her pulse jumped, the tiny action telling her all the answers she’d been searching for.

“So?” It came out breathier and deeper than she intended and the pilot’s eyes sought out hers, Waverly’s pupils growing. She hastily cleared her throat, unable to stop the blush that bloomed across her cheeks.

“The hangar, Ms. Earp?” She gave the pilot a small smile.

There. That sounded more professional. _Gotta knock it off, Haught. You’re at work!_

—

Waverly was on fire. She knew the agent had spoken again but she was still stuck on that one syllable and what it had ignited in her. She knew she had to shove it down though, she couldn’t just do what those two letters made her want to do- back that tall drink of beautiful up against the closest surface and- _woah woah ok, slow down there, killer._

She blinked and realized the redhead was patiently waiting for her to respond. She took a shallow breath and figured it must be the most rational subject.

“The hangar?”

The redhead nodded, a small amused smile ghosting across her lips.

Waverly nodded back. She could do this. “This way.”

She set off across the airstrip toward the hangar at a decent clip, not checking to see if the agent followed.

—

 _Oh sweet mother of-_ behind her??

Nicole’s eyes disobeyed her instantly, zeroing in on the pilot’s shapely backside, the well-fitting pants of the mechanic’s uniform unable to hide those particular curves and the agent stumbled in her first step to follow, cursing herself under her breath.

Thankfully the pilot hadn’t seen, too preoccupied with setting a blistering pace toward the hangar. The agent hastened to catch up, her long legs easily reducing the distance between them.

When they got close to the hangar she reached out unthinking and touched the pilot’s arm.

“Hey, wait.”

—

Waverly stopped immediately and glanced down at the long fingers wrapped gently around her forearm. The agent dropped her hand though Waverly felt the touch like a brand, fingers whispering across her skin as they went.

She looked up at the redhead.

“What?”

The agent pursed her lips and spoke.

“You’re not allowed to come in. We have to set the boundary, and after that, it’s off limits to you until we finish the investigation, sorry.”

Waverly raised an eyebrow. She had to be kidding.

“So I’m not allowed in my own hangar until you’re done?”

“Or the thirty feet surrounding, yeah.”

“So how the hell am I supposed to prepare for my show this weekend if I can’t get the plane I’m flying out of its hangar?”

Waverly could see the agent was apologetic, but shook her head.

“I’ll try to get this done as quickly as I can, but I’m sorry, that’s the law.”

Waverly snorted. “Wow. First you chase a mobster across my airfield, then I find out said mobster shot my plane up, causing me to almost crash; and now you lock up my other plane, looking for whatever he left behind? You guys are really having a lot of fun making my life difficult. Oh, and you _will_ be paying for the damages to the Gee Bee.”  
  
—  
  
Nicole started. “Did you say bullet holes?”  
  
Her mind shot immediately to when she had hit the goon in the passenger seat of the fleeing car, his gat pulling wildly and spraying bullets into the air. He had to have hit the plane as it went by overhead.  
  
Nicole’s face must have shown her feelings of guilt, the pilot’s eyes narrowed.  
  
“You know exactly what I’m talking about, don’t you?”  
  
The agent couldn’t help the twinge in her belly. By professional standards, she shouldn’t admit to anything, this was an investigation and while the Earps weren’t suspects, putting her own actions in the mix wasn’t advised and would definitely make things more complicated.  
  
_Say something official, you nit!_  
  
“I can’t comment on an ongoing investigation.” She gave the pilot an apologetic smile.  
  
Waverly wasn’t having it.  
  
“Bullshit. You know exactly what happened. You know how those bullet holes ended up in my plane, don’t you. And you’re still going to weasel your way from the truth. What should I have expected from a fucking Fed, even one that looks like-”  
  
The pilot’s eyes widened, she’d clearly said more than she meant to in her anger and the words hung between them, Nicole feeling an uncomfortable mixture of unease and interest.  
  
They stood staring for longer than felt reasonable, both kicking themselves to break the tension, Nicole wasn’t sure by moving closer or farther apart, but then she was struck with an idea.  
  
“There’s a back to the hangar, right?”  
  
The pilot blinked. “What?”  
  
Nicole was on a roll, her brain firing for a way to even out the issue.  
  
“The car we chased drove into the back of the hangar and then out the front here, right? So, I’ll go in now, inspect your plane first, and then we’ll push it out the back of the hangar and out thirty feet. If it’s not in the hangar when Dolls gets there, then it’s not part of the investigation and you can fly it. He wouldn’t know it’s in there now, so how would he know where it started?”  
  
—  
  
Waverly was stunned. “Isn’t that going to get you in a ton of trouble?”  
  
The redhead sighed and raised one challenging eyebrow. “Only if I get caught. You stay here, look angry if you need to,” she dared to wink at the pilot and got a flushed face for her efforts, “and whistle if you see Dolls coming. I’ll do this quick and then call you in.”  
  
With that she was off toward the hangar, leaving the pilot to fold her arms and wait, keeping an eye out for the agent’s partner.  
  
—  
  
Waverly watched the retreating form of the agent, whose name she really needed to ask for again somehow; though Haught suited her very well, she thought, a first name would be nice.  
  
The redhead’s plan she knew was surely going against Bureau protocol, and Waverly had noticed the woman still dodged explaining how she knew about the bullet holes, but if Pocket Rocket was free, she could give the agent a little bit of wiggle room.  
  
_Plus that retreating form wasn’t so bad to look at either, sheesh._  
  
__  
  
Nicole wandered into the hangar and took a look around. It was pretty much what she expected, pet projects in various states, work benches and tools galore, and right in the middle, Waverly’s plane. She walked up to the prop and touched it lightly. She’d never actually been this close to a plane before, and had never flown in one. She could almost feel the power under the stilled blades, and imagined what it must be like for Waverly to be in the cockpit, taming the air.  
  
The agent walked further along the plane, noticed the name painted on the side and did a double take.  
  
_Pocket Rocket?_  
  
She couldn’t help the shiver down her spine and glanced briefly back toward the entrance, Waverly still standing watch, facing away from the hangar. Now, was that name for the speed of the aircraft or the power of its pilot? Nicole felt sorely tempted to find out. _Stop it, Haught, focus!_  
  
Nicole realized she wasn’t going to be able to get up into the plane to check the cockpit in her current configuration, so she found a clean bit of work bench, placed her hat on it and removed her suit jacket, folding it in half delicately. She turned back her shirt sleeves, hiked up her skirt and climbed onto the lower wing, still somewhat in awe that she was about to peer into an airplane.  
  
She checked the cockpit and passenger seat, but found nothing out of the ordinary. Nicole did notice a faded picture tucked amongst the cockpit’s dials of a much younger Waverly, in a flight cap too big for her head, posed with a scowling Wynonna and the two people who must be their parents. It almost felt like something she wasn’t supposed to see and glanced quickly away, though she smiled to note Waverly’s spirit had been evident early on.  
  
As there wasn’t anything interesting in the plane, she turned, still standing on the wing and whistled for the pilot who turned and came jogging in.  
  
__  
  
Whatever Waverly had expected to see, it wasn’t what greeted her, the agent standing on Pocket Rocket’s wing, her hat and coat gone, thin silk blouse on display with the sleeves rolled up, holding onto one of the wing supports, looking like a woman out of one of Waverly’s dreams. She slowed and stopped a good few feet away from the plane, not sure how to approach the redhead.  
  
“Nothing too interesting here, so I think we can rule out you hiding anything inside.” The agent smiled down at her.  
  
“Alright.” Waverly was still stuck staring, her own smile coming easily to her lips. “You look good up there. Ever been in a plane?”  
  
Agent Haught blushed and shook her head. “No, this is actually the first time I’ve been this close to one.”  
  
Waverly grinned. “Really? Fancy lady like you, in the FBI, and they don’t fly you around?”  
  
The agent took a step toward the edge of the wing, looking for an easy way to get down.  
  
“No, they definitely don’t fly the field agents around in planes, we’re nowhere near that important. I’ve spent a fair amount of time on trains though.”  
  
Waverly made a face. “Too slow. There’s nothing like being up in the air. Here, let me help you down.”  
  
She walked to the wing and held her hand out to the agent, the distance between wing and floor a bit too awkward to take in one leap down. Her foot hooked the box placed under the wing for a step and she pulled it out, gesturing to the agent. The redhead took her hand and she delighted in their touch, the smooth skin of the agent soft against her own.  
  
Waverly was as respectful as she could be, looking away delicately as the taller woman lifted her skirt to be able to bend her knees and step down to the box, turning back only as the redhead stepped off the box and right in front of her, the closest they had been yet.  
  
Their eyes met, searching, but the redhead stepped back with a twitch of a rueful smile, smoothing her skirt with her free hand, the other still in Waverly’s. She looked at their joined hands and Waverly let go with a twitch, she’d been lost in the sweet smell of the woman so close to her, a fine vanilla and something else she couldn’t quite put her finger on.  
  
The agent cleared her throat and gestured to the airplane. “So. What’s the easiest way to do this, Ms. Earp?”  
  
__  
  
Nicole had to step away from the pilot, looking that closely into her hazel eyes was too dangerous, especially after the look on Waverly’s face as she had entered the hangar, somewhere between awe and hunger.  
  
Waverly snorted. “If you’re going to help me jailbreak my plane from your highly secretive Federal investigation, I think you can call me by my first name.”  
  
Nicole smiled at the pilot and nodded, a little flip of her stomach carrying through the pilot’s words.  
  
“Sure, Waverly. I can do that.” It was the first time she’d said the name out loud and the smile that escaped as she did was warm, far too warm to be misconstrued.  
  
Waverly’s eyes crinkled as she smiled back. “So then what do I call you? I expect your given name isn’t Agent.”  
  
She laughed. “No, it’s Nicole.”  
  
—  
  
“Nicole.” Ah, her kingdom for a name.  
  
Waverly was warmed already by the sound of this gorgeous redhead, Nicole, speaking her name with that smile on her face, a smile that made Waverly want to see how she sounded saying her name, _over and over- get a hold of yourself, Earp! Somewhat!_  
  
Nicole’s lips quirked and Waverly found herself stepping closer. “So, Nicole, you climbed up into my plane pretty handily, but how are you with manual labor?”  
  
The redhead pushed at her sleeves and gave Waverly a cheeky smile. “I guess we’ll see.”  
  
Waverly’s internal monologue nearly growled at that but she made the safer decision and walked past the woman and toward the wooden chocks holding the plane in place. Thankfully the biplane was pretty light, the Standard J-1 made to train with and she knew the two of them could easily push the plane out of the hangar.  
  
—  
  
Nicole had caught the look in Waverly’s eyes before she’d walked past and she knew she was playing with fire, but she was compelled to by her own interest.  
  
“So where do you want me?”  
  
The agent stifled a chuckle as Waverly stumbled a bit, turning back to face her, the pilot’s face made unreadable with visible effort. The pilot cleared her throat and nodded toward the closest wing, her voice a little rough.  
  
“Just there, if you don’t mind. I’m going to move the chocks, and then we can push it backward.”  
  
Nicole took up position where Waverly had indicated and watched the pilot pull the wooden blocks from behind the wheels before she moved over to the other wing.  
  
“Ok, on the count of three, we’ll start pushing. It’s a little hard on the start, but once we get it moving, it’s not too heavy.”  
  
Nicole gave Waverly a smile, though the pilot couldn’t see her, “Sure thing. Just give me the countdown.”  
  
She braced her weight against the wing and not for the first or the last time, cursed that she still had to do everything in heels, even in the FBI.  
  
“Ok,” Waverly called. “Three, two, one, push!”  
  
Both women heaved against the wings, fighting the sluggish initial inertia until their efforts won out and the plane started rolling backward comfortably. It was a straight shot out the back of the hangar and the two women moved in tandem, Nicole delighting in how maneuverable the aircraft was. She could only imagine what it felt like to cut through the air so easily.  
  
As they pushed the plane past the doors of the hangar, Nicole started counting out the feet in her head and when she knew they had passed thirty, she called out to Waverly.  
  
“Hey, this should be good!”  
  
The pilot slowed their movement and Nicole helped, holding onto the wing as Waverly pulled the chocks from where she had strung them around her neck and went to fit them behind the wheels. Once they were safely in place, Nicole leaned back against the edge of the wing, low enough that she could almost sit on it. She wiped at her face, the morning sun now wide awake and beating down on the blacktop of the airstrip.  
  
—  
  
Waverly came closer to Nicole, the agent resting against the wing, and Waverly smiled to see the woman a bit more relaxed. She pushed at the prop as she passed, the wooden propeller swinging back into place with a well-oiled movement.  
  
She met the warm brown eyes of the redhead and her mouth quirked up, the agent having at some point gotten a smear of grease on her cheek.  
  
“Hey, let me get that for you.” Waverly moved within a step or two of Nicole and gestured to her. “You’ve got something on your face.”  
  
Nicole’s eyes twitched around like she was trying to look and Waverly laughed. “Be easier if I just-” She reached up with her thumb and gently wiped at the grease, the smudge growing larger instead.  
  
“Oh shoot, I just made it worse.” Waverly’s voice was apologetic, but Nicole’s eyes had fluttered shut at the contact before she opened them again.  
  
“Maybe you’re just too far away.” The agent reached forward and pulled on one of the hanging sleeves of the mechanic’s uniform, Waverly taking the last stumbling steps closer until her thighs were pressed against the redhead’s slightly bent knees.  
  
Waverly’s mouth went dry while she also appreciated the smoothness of the move. The agent was now giving her a coy look and there was nothing more the pilot wanted to do other than finish the distance and press her lips against the redhead’s. It must have showed, Nicole’s smile grew knowing. Waverly bit her lip and kept eye contact while she lifted her hand back to Nicole’s face, her other hand coming to rest on the redhead’s hip, the sharp intake of breath letting her know it was exactly the right thing to do.  
  
Her smile came easy as she traced the contour of the redhead’s cheek, wiping away the last of the grease. She could feel the heat of the other woman’s body under her hands, and while it was starting to drive her crazy, being this close, she was enjoying the slow dance they were playing at.  
  
—  
  
For her part, Nicole had held herself back magnificently, not surging forward at the first touch of Waverly’s thumb against her skin. The pilot was breathtaking this close, the way her eyes disappeared into crinkles when she smiled, the confident tilt to her head and the sharp jawline it created; Nicole was lost in the woman before her.  
  
When she dared pull Waverly closer, she knew there was a risk she was misinterpreting the pilot’s playful banter, but when a strong hand closed around her hip she felt the race of heat it produced, the quick breath of air left her before she even realized.  
  
Waverly smiled at her, not hiding the cheeky curl to her lip as she cleaned at the mark on Nicole’s face.  
  
“There. All better.” Waverly’s thumb hovered over her cheek still, their eyes hadn’t left the other’s and Nicole could feel herself wanting to hurtle toward the sweet unknown of Waverly’s lips.  
  
“My angel.”  
  
Waverly blushed at that, her eyelashes dipping low before she looked up at Nicole again, her gaze sending sparks through the redhead.  
  
Waverly lowered her thumb to Nicole’s jawline and brushed along the edge, her eyes breaking with the redhead’s to follow the path of the movement. A shiver coursed through Nicole at the barely-there touch and the small hum of pleasure left her before she could stop it, Waverly’s twitch as she heard it noticeable. Their eyes jumped to make contact, both their pupils large.  
  
“Can I-” Waverly’s eyes flicked to her mouth then back again.  
  
“Please.”  
  
Waverly’s hand curled to her face and then they were kissing, Waverly’s lips an unimaginable softness against her own. She wasn’t new to her own desires, but kissing Waverly was unlike anything else she’d experienced, she could feel the slight roughness of the pilot’s callouses against the skin of her face, the strength in the hand holding her hip; she let herself get lost in the sensations of the other woman, their lips moving together seamlessly.  
  
“Haught, you in here?”  
  
The agent jumped, her lips pulling away from Waverly’s, though her hand curled tighter to the arm of the uniform she still held in her fist.  
  
“Out here, Dolls!”  
  
She looked quickly at Waverly, the pilot’s eyes blinking as if she was in a slight daze and she tugged on the sleeve to get the woman’s attention.  
  
“Waverly, you’ve got to move so I can!”  
  
The pilot jumped back as if she still wasn’t quite present but she let Nicole pass, the redhead rushing over to look like she was inspecting what was underneath a tarp dumped against the back of the hangar. She spared a look at Waverly as Dolls appeared in the doorway and the pilot wasn’t faring much better, a dreamy look across her face.  
  
“You alright there, Ms. Earp? You look like you’ve been out in the sun too long, can I get you some water?”  
  
Waverly blinked and shook her head, brushing distractedly at her mouth with the back of her hand.  
  
“No, I’m fine, thanks, I’ll get it myself.” She cleared her throat and walked toward the hangar, shooting a small distracted smile toward Nicole behind Dolls’ back as she went.  
  
“Water, and then you go right back beyond the thirty feet, alright?” Dolls turned to level his most professional gaze at her.  
  
Nicole watched as the pilot gave him a lazy salute and stepped into the hangar.  
  
—  
  
Waverly was now quite sure this was how you felt when you kissed someone and decided you never wanted to kiss anyone else. How could anyone else compare to how the redhead’s lips felt against her own? Her heart was pounding a million miles an hour and she felt like she could take off into the sky, no jetpack needed.  
  
She stopped at the jug of water by the hangar door and grinned as she pulled the cork out, lifting the jug to take a swig.  
  
“What’s got you looking like you’re dizzy for a dame?”  
  
Waverly nearly spat out the water, and choked a bit as she swallowed. She met Wynonna’s amused yet concerned eyes as she lowered the jug to the table and replaced the cork.  
  
“Nothing! Just uh, got the Fed to help us. Felt accomplished.”  
  
“Uh huh.” Wynonna leveled her gaze at her sister but Waverly bore the scrutiny for a few seconds before Wynonna shrugged and rolled her eyes.  
  
“Ok, keep your confidences. You look weirdly flushed though. You should probably drink more water. Anyway, this Dolls fellow isn’t all bad after all, for a G-man, said he’s going to look into the paperwork to get us reimbursed. Said we shouldn’t hold our breaths about it, but at least I didn’t have to deck him. Good thing too, he’s got a pretty face, be sad to mess it up.”  
  
Waverly chuckled. “That’s good though, about the money. I know we have the new project,” she shot a glance to where the agents were speaking together by the plane far enough away not to overhear, “but that will help us get the Gee Bee up in the air sooner and then we won’t have to risk using the jetpack.”  
  
Wynonna sighed as they moved to exit the hangar. “We can’t trust that that money will find us anytime soon, and I really don’t like the thought of you using that thing, but we’ll have to do what keeps us in the air and the airfield running. Speaking of, how’d Pocket Rocket end up out he- ow! What the hell’d you kick me for?”  
  
Waverly felt bad for it, but only a little, Dolls was walking toward them and she didn’t want to throw Nicole’s kindness out the window and get her in trouble, especially if she ever wanted to kiss the woman again. And she really, _really_ wanted to.  
  
—  
  
“So what was that about, Haught?”  
  
They were on their way back to the Bureau, their cataloguing of the hangar finished for the day, Dolls’ at the wheel as always, his voice kind but curious. Nicole looked down at her hands folded in her lap and then back out the windshield. She weighed telling Dolls the part or whole truth. She sighed.  
  
“I may have bent the rules a little.”  
  
“What’s a little?”  
  
“I inspected and then helped Waverly Earp push her plane out of the hangar so it couldn’t be counted as part of our investigation.”  
  
_“You what?”_  
  
The car swerved a little as Dolls’ turned to look at her, glancing back to straighten the vehicle before he turned to her again.  
  
“We’d already made a mess of her other plane, and she said if they didn’t have access to that one, they’d be unable to make money, and Dolls, it is our fault the plane crashed, my shot that hit the goon in the passenger seat was the reason her plane got filled full of lead. We’re the reason she’s in trouble now. Hell, _I’m_ the reason. I had to…do something to make it right. And there was nothing in the plane anyway! I did a full inspection, top to bottom.”  
  
Dolls shook his head and let out a long breath.  
  
“What am I going to do with you, Haught? Your heart is in the right place, but you can’t pull things like this, you have to trust the system.”  
  
“The system? C’mon Dolls, we both know the system is rigged. You know that a million times better than I! We _have_ to do what we can, where we can.”  
  
Dolls leveled an iron look at her. “We are agents, first, Haught. We made that oath, even when we know they could do better, even when we know they may fail us. We don’t do it for us; we do it for our country.”  
  
Chastened, Nicole looked out the window. After a long pause, she heard Dolls sigh again.  
  
“I’m not going to say anything; I never saw the plane anywhere other than where I found it.”  
  
“Thank you, Dolls. Truly. You’re aces.”  
  
“Don’t start, Haught. Plus you can’t tell me this has nothing to do with your feelings on that dame.”  
  
“Um.”  
  
“Save your panicking. I don’t care; just don’t do anything stupid, alright? This is your first case, and if the Chief finds out you’re up to your neck in this because of someone inside the investigation, you’re toast. And for a dish, even as hot as that tomato? You’d get run out of town. So play it smart.”  
  
“Of course. This means everything to me. I’m not going to mess this up, Dolls.”  
  
He nodded and turned his eyes back to the road.  
  
The trip back to the Bureau was spent in silence, Nicole’s thoughts too caught up in Waverly’s lips to truly heed Dolls’ words.

 

**Author's Note:**

> As always, thanks so much for reading!!!!
> 
>  
> 
> Come bother me on the twitters if you’d like: @DrdPirateBrown


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